Water-deficit or dehydration is considered to be a predominant environmental stress and is often associated with other stresses viz., salinity, high temperature, and nutritional deficiencies. Plants, being sessile, have evolved distinct mechanisms to sense such adverse conditions and initiate defense responses. During the past decade, the physiological and molecular basis for plant responses to dehydration tolerance has been the subject of priority research (Krasensky et al., J. Exp. Bot., 2012, 63, 1593-1608; Lawlor et al., J. Exp. Bot., 2013, 64, 83-108). Most of the earlier understanding of cellular responses to dehydration came from gene expression studies (Matsui et al., Plant Cell Physiol, 2008, 49, 1135-1149; Shinozaki et al., J. Exp. Bot., 2007, 58, 221-227)
Although such strategies allow identification of stress-responsive genes, they do not necessarily reflect the actual dynamics of final gene products, the proteins (Dumas-Gaudot et al., Proteomics, 2004, 4, 451-453). Proteomic analysis offers an opportunity to catalog temporal patterns of protein accumulation during stress perception, adaptation and cell defense (Abdalla et al., J. Proteomics, 2012, 75, 2361-2374; Bhushan et al, J. Proteomics, 2011, 10, 2027-2046). Further, the level of proteins integrates post-transcriptional and post-translational processing that modulates the quantity, localization and efficiency of the final cell products. This information can hence be included with the annotation of the corresponding gene (Baginsky et al., J. Exp. Bot., 2006, 57, 1485-1491). Thus, identifying novel proteins, determining their expression patterns in dehydration response and understanding their functions would provide the basis for effective engineering strategies to improve crop stress tolerance.
Increasing world-wide demand for staple food products such as rice has put an ever increasing pressure on both agricultural practices and scientific innovation on increasing yield of plants. Concurrently, there has been a demand for sustainable agriculture in the face of increased use of growth stimulants, and vagaries of nature such as water availability or temperature conditions. There is a current pressing need to develop methods, and new varieties of food crops that are better equipped to handle both abiotic and biotic stress factors.